Its Decor Is Humble, Its Hummus First-Class

JERUSALEM Nader Sairi scooped the tan paste from a bowl into plastic containers, stacking them in columns five high along the wooden countertop. In a kitchen set off by a thin wall, his older brother, Fadi, tended to a pair of huge steaming pots simmering on a camp stove.

It was 5:25 a.m. on a shivering-cold morning, a half-moon still high in the black sky. The work at Ikermawi Restaurant, an epicurean institution for the Everyman, was underway to a soundtrack of Koranic verse from a radio playing inside the shawarma shop next door.

The restaurant has occupied a space the size of a large utility closet outside the Old City's Damascus Gate for three generations of Ikermawis. Its menu, as simple as the unadorned interior, consists of three words: hummus, foul and musabaheh.

Hummus -- a thick spread of ground chickpeas, garlic, lemon, parsley, cumin (an Ikermawi special ingredient) and tahini, a tangy sesame mixture -- is a culinary bridge that spans the Israeli-Palestinian divide. Few if any are reputed to make it better than the Ikermawi family, Jerusalem restaurateurs since before Israel's founding nearly six decades ago.

Over that time, the restaurant has been the first essential stop in a long day for hundreds of laborers, who then catch collective taxis along the traffic circle outside to jobs across Israel. The dress code is boots and paint-splotched dungarees, head scarves and woolen caps. A "No Smoking" sign appears on the wall, but it is more a wish than a rule. Ashtrays sit on the three small tables.

During a two-hour daybreak visit, scores of men and a lone woman placed orders to be consumed later on construction sites from the coastal city of Netanya to the Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim in the West Bank. Most were well-known regulars, a drowsy dawn patrol of few words, who generally did not need to be asked whether they wanted extra lemon or a dribble of fava-bean paste known as foul along the top of their hummus.

Before sunrise, the restaurant appeared as an Edward Hopper painting set in Palestine, a storefront of light along a row of shuttered shops. An old man in a head scarf hunched over a plate of hummus, sipping tea. A pair of 20-something laborers worked silently through breakfast at the next table.

Nader Sairi, 23, skimmed a cloud of foam off a pot of boiling chickpeas. Then he poured tahini into a mixer swirling with a batch of rich paste. Customers began wandering in from the dark in twos and threes.

Remez Mahlahi and his cousin, Sami, crowded the counter. In boots and jeans dotted with commas of white paint, the pair commuted from the Shuafat refugee camp on Jerusalem's eastern edge, stopping for hummus en route to a construction site across from the Israeli president's residence.

"Hummus, foul, six pieces of bread," Remez said groggily. Nader Sairi bundled the order into a black plastic bag.

By 6 a.m., the stockpile of containers and sandwich bags filled with hummus had dwindled to a few. Mohammed Ikermawi, the founder's grandson, arrived from his home near the Mount of Olives and slid behind the counter. The Sairis began quartering onions for the coming rush.

Ikermawi, 42, is a genial hummus purist. You want fries, shawarma or other dishes generally available at a hummus place? Go elsewhere. The only addition to his menu comes during Ramadan, when he sells takeout falafel.

"Hummus and foul?" Nader Sairi asked a regular, knowing the answer.

"May God protect and care for you," the man answered.

A man in a blue smock squeezed past the thickening scrum with two large boxes of flat bread from Salahadin Street. Fadi Sairi stacked the delivery in a row behind the counter, then filled a stainless-steel drawer with green chili peppers.

At 6:30 a.m., the restaurant resembled a trading floor. Hurried customers, watching the time tick by, shouted orders to Ikermawi, calm and collected with his blue sweater buttoned to the top.

"Two hummus, foul, onion, pepper, no tomato," one shouted.

"Twelve shekels" (almost $3), the response came.

The call-and-response quickened and, as the first sign of pink appeared through the narrow slits above the Damascus Gate, Ikermawi and the Sairi brothers struggled to keep up. The hummus mixer rumbled in the corner.

"Here you go, habibi," Nader said, using a term of endearment, as he handed a tissue to a customer whose jacket sleeve bore a large smear of hummus.

An Israeli guard at the U.S. Consulate on Nablus Road picked up four containers for his co-workers. A math teacher at nearby St. George's Secondary School who commutes each day from Bethlehem ate a plate of hummus before class.

By 7 a.m., the pace slowed as the sun finally appeared above the Old City ramparts.

"May peace be upon all of you," a man holding a pita bread stuffed with fish said as he entered. He held his sandwich open to Ikermawi, who placed a dollop of musabaheh (essentially the hummus mixture without the chickpeas) inside. No charge.

The man saluted as three others rushed in to place orders. Ikermawi reached for the spoon.